Journalism From Inside a Car

I'm a poster child for what may be a new wave of journalism, but I'm a dying breed.

My apartment is littered with back issues of all kinds of print publications, but I spend my days working to serve a growing number of people who might not remember the last time they read a newspaper. I'm a mobile journalist, or MoJo, working for The News-Press in Fort Myers, Fla., and I'm writing to share my experience in an unusual job that may soon be commonplace.

My stories go online first and to the print edition second. I sit, usually in my well-worn 2003 Nissan Sentra, and use my laptop to construct a Web page with my story, a headline, a one-or-two paragraph summary and usually a photo or an info box and post it directly to news-press.com. I add a gallery of the photos I've just taken, if the story warrants it, or link to an invitation for reader feedback I put up on the site's forum, and zoom off in search of my next post.

Hot, Fresh Journalism. No Waiting

Plenty of people with stacks of newspapers at home cringe at the thought of reporters never coming into the office to sit down at their desks and producing unedited content for all the world to see on the Internet. I'm not one of them. I don't want to be the next newspaper staffer laid off because the industry isn't what it used to be.

It's a necessary step in the evolution of our craft, and it's not up to us whether we want to go along. The readers have the power, and if they want to drag us from the comforts of the print world into the uncharted expanse of the Internet, they will, and it's obvious they're already doing it.

I'm not going along kicking and screaming, mind you. If I weren't a mobile journalist, I wouldn't be a journalist at all. It's a cutting-edge job, and my input is not only welcome but anxiously awaited. I'm a guinea pig for new equipment, and I report back to editors what high-tech tools help me do my job and what's taking up space on my passenger seat.

It's a smarter way of doing business. I'm in the field where stories are happening instead of sitting at my desk, waiting for a phone to ring. I don't miss important calls, either, since I've got a cell phone that's always in my pocket and not ringing away at my desk while I'm out of earshot at the copier. Technology has made people more mobile, and journalism has to react.

The delays caused by malfunctions, dead spots and plain-old technological shortcomings are burdensome, but nothing compared to waiting a day to get the story in print first, or missing out on a story because I was tied to a desk and couldn't take a drive down a side street.

Whether mobile journalism ultimately proves to be a good idea or a bad idea is anyone's guess. It is a new idea, though, and that's what intrigues me. I don't believe in any of that hired corporate blather about being ready for the 21st century, but I do think newspaper companies have to be prepared to absorb a withering blow from the Internet.

We can't do journalism the way we've been doing it unless we want to become irrelevant. Millions of readers have already left us behind and are wondering why we haven't kept up with them. Professional journalism has its place online, and it's high time we take it. And it's about time to clear my living room table of all those papers.

Chuck Myron is a "mobile journalist" working for The News-Press based in Fort Myers, Fla. Next week: Techniques and Technology. How Chuck Gets it Done

What do you think? Would you want a job like this? Should journalists be allowed to post directly to a newspaper website? Is Chuck right that journalists who don't adopt these techniques are in danger of becoming irrelevant? Weigh in here with your comments!